Today's data hosting computing facilities often encompass multiple data centers distributed in many countries in order to better serve globally-based customers. These facilities employs a large number of servers housed in server rooms. The servers provide myriad functionalities and services, and are networked so that each server may communicate with one another and with other equipment. Communication in the data centers are most often based on networks running the IP protocol suite. These computing facilities also use equipment such as routers and switches to transport traffic between the servers and to the outside world.